


You say I'm bawling (I say I'm begging)

by GoldenGarter



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, And Also a Vampire, Hux is a Werewolf, In Which Snoke is Not so Powerful, Leia Tries to Be a Better Mother by Making Questionable Decisions, Lima Syndrome, M/M, Pretty Much Questionable Decisions on Everyone's Part, Ren has powers, mention of decapitation, sorta - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-24
Updated: 2016-07-24
Packaged: 2018-07-26 09:33:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7569076
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GoldenGarter/pseuds/GoldenGarter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The red wolf was the one that had lured Ben from his house on the river years ago. </p><p>It's only fitting that he's the one to drag Ren back home from the crypt. </p><p> </p><p>Featuring: Vague Irish mythology regarding werewolves. Briefly mentioned cross-country road trip shenanigans.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You say I'm bawling (I say I'm begging)

**Author's Note:**

> I've been playing around with this AU in my head for a while. Mostly the road trip shenanigans part. Which oddly enough gets barely mentioned here lol.

The clock on the side table doesn’t make any noise. It has an old-fashioned face with a second-hand steadily turning but it’s not an analog. Just a clever bit of pixel display made to trick the quick pass of an eye into thinking there’s gears and hands and a completely different set of moving parts underneath.

 

He’s a bit envious of the clock in that case. If he was better at making his outside hide how he worked internally maybe things would have ended differently.

 

Ren’s replacement interrogator-tuned-therapist is late to their first day on the job. He tries to summon some feeling of insult or irritation but he’s mostly just tired. Sleep has been difficult of late. Those first two months it had been easy enough to get to sleep. He was so overwhelmed with all of the extended family members and friends clambering for his attention. Once upon a time that was everything he wanted. As Hux predicted the initial clamor of spouting apologies and clinging possessiveness faded quickly. Now it was only his immediate family who remained out of some sense of “This will not happen again on our watch”. They swirl around the house with fury in their hearts, ready to lunge at imaginary shadows coming to steal Ben away again.

 

_Why’d I do it? Hells, Ren… because you were hurting and I wanted to— I wanted to keep you in a vice, in a maw, clamped down between my molars where no one could reach you… you know I still do…_

 

God, he feels 50 years old now watching everyone scramble around. As if the people twice his age are just some rowdy bunch of teens ready to start a war with an enemy that’s long-dead. It’s not too far from the truth. They were all a part of the Rebellion twenty-five years ago. Maybe this whole thing has just stirred up something in their blood like fish nets scrapping along the bottom of the river.

 

But he watched the enemy die. It burned and burned with the forest that day. Ben had slumped against the ranger’s hut on the edge of the park, uncaring as his powers raged unchecked. Even in his numbed trance there hadn’t been much damage. Mostly clawed up mulch and landscaping. The police had been called, the police had called the FBI, and the FBI had called his mother.

 

There’s something that hasn’t changed over the long months: his “incidents” are few and far between. And even when he has breakdowns it’s nowhere near the level they used to be before he was taken away. He’s been good. He has no choice but to be good and keep his promise. He endures the alternating waves of pity, shame, resentment, and wrath from his family that longs to avenge him.

 

_I didn’t save any of the others. I wasn’t even planning on saving you, Ren._

 

He wasn’t a morning person before he was stolen. But the months spent in the dark crypts with Snoke make him appreciate the sun now. It also reminds him of that long drive from where he was hidden in the north to his family’s rural estate along the southern borders. Hux had never learned to drive in the States (hadn’t really learned to drive back in Ireland either) so Ren had been the one driving their commandeered truck with the covered bed.

 

In the mornings he takes the worn, yellowed copy of _National Geographic_ to the study on the second floor that faces the river. Traces the curved architecture and the stiff lines of the paragraphs as the sunrise paints the room and paper in pale light.

 

The windows in the covering for the truck bed had not been tinted. The people they passed on the road and at truck stops weren’t as observant as Hux had anxiously feared. They thought “dog” or “Husky” or something along the lines of a canine friend being carted around in the back of the truck. No one ever thought: “Gosh! There’s a six-foot-and-some-change-tall werewolf in the back of that truck! Holy smokes! The driver is that freak from the papers whose grandfather committed mass genocide in the war! Quick, get your pitchforks and tar!”

 

They were both so strung out those days spent on the road. The first two had been spent taking shifts sleeping; constantly looking over their shoulder for Snoke’s pale form or those of his thralls. On the fourth evening Ben had pulled into the crowded lot of some local family restaurant and crawled into the truck bed with Hux. It didn’t take much effort to move the half-asleep werewolf. He was more fur and fluff than anything else.

 

_Yes, yes. Harr-harr. The runt of the litter! The red-headed step-child! Let’s see how many other bleedin’ names we can find to apply to my person._

 

Halfway through the third month the novelty of having a mattress in a stationary bedframe wore off. He has an old blanket rolled up in his bed. He hated it as a kid cause the fibers were too stiff and poked him in the face. He’s gone through the entire assortment of blankets in the house five times. This one is the closest in texture and color to Hux’s fur. It’s a sad replacement though. The color is an obnoxiously neon orange and even though the werewolf’s fur was bristly, and stabbed his nose, there was a much softer undercoat. If Ben pushed past the topcoat of bristles it was just a dry softness.

 

From their time imprisoned in the crypts to their time in the truck bed Hux had endured Ren’s touches with more grace than expected (considering his personality).

 

_I swear to Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, Ren! Don’t you dar—_

**_Guess you’re all bark? No bite??_ **

****

Hux had bitten him hard enough to draw blood for that.

 

In the strengthening light of the sun Ren inspects his right forearm. Amongst the dark spots of the moles and wiry hair there’s the pink scar tissue of the bite. He had imagined the scar would be very obvious at the time of the bite (it had bled a lot) but now it seems too subtle. Hux has left too permanent a mark in his mind and life. He should’ve had a matching influence on his body. He should have shredded Ren between his teeth at some point. Or left raking claw marks in his side. The little pinpricks of pink will fade to white over time and blend in with his complexion.

 

Hux wasn’t rough enough with him. Even though he was the one that stole Ren, took him to Snoke, led him to be slaughtered. There had been too many nights locked in the crypt together. With Hux guarding him an hoping that—

 

_This one has to be it. This one is the best so far. Master Snoke could not find a better one. This one has to be it._

There was a desperation in that crypt between the two of them. They hated each other. They had doomed each other in their heedless sprint.

 

“Ben?”

 

He’s no longer in the crypt. Not in the truck bed. Nor is he curled up in the pleasant un-humanness of Hux’s mind. He’s not even in the study with the morning light spilling over the torn-out page about a mausoleum on the other side of the world.

 

He’s in one of the corner rooms downstairs where he’s received FBI agents and therapists. They had him recount what happened. Snoke luring psychics with false promises of becoming an elite in his coven. Of immortality and all the other things associated with vampires nowadays. He explains to the agents what Hux explained to him: non-human genetics are not transferable to humans. A cat scratching a human doesn’t make them grow whiskers. At most it makes them a bit sick and in need of some antibiotics.

 

He doesn’t mention Hux. Ever. Doesn’t want them to blame him and hunt him down. Wherever he is. Now that he’s sated that instinctual need to guide someone who was lost back to where they belong. He could be anywhere.

 

_At some point in our evolutionary history enough non-humans benefitted from the mimicry of humans that those genes became dominant. Those that could mimic better, could shed fur more quickly or had shorter fangs, were more likely to live and pass on said mimicry genes. Evolution changed our behaviour. My ancestors guided lost men out of the woods, ensuring that the humans would be indebted and not betray them to hunters. Survive. Pass on genes. Rinse and Repeat._

 

“Ben…”

 

He’s dragged back out of the memories of this room again. It’s his mother. At some point she walked around the armchair and kneeled in front of him.

 

“Benny… where did you go?”

 

She seems so much older now that he’s back. There’s a subdued quality to her when she used to be a spitfire before. Like his return has diminished her in some way. He needs to answer her before the worry claims more of her brown hair or smooth face.

 

“I was just thinking about where Taj probably is by now.” To the FBI and his family Hux doesn’t exist. There was only ever Snoke speaking into his mind. He explained it away as some aftereffect of feeding on human psychics. There was no wolf at the end of the street that had offered to lead him away one night.

 

Hux was too important to just push under the rug, to act like he never existed. So Ren made up “Taj”. The stray that he had picked up along his drive back home. That ran off right before Ren finally called his mother from a payphone half-a-state away from the house.

 

“You never told us why you named him Taj,” his mother murmurs, resting her head against the arm of the chair as she watches him. There’s something of an indulging quality to her tonight for some reason. He doesn’t want to look into her mind and find out. Doesn’t want to be in anyone’s head again after the sheer comfort found in Hux’s mind.

 

 

“I… I found him outside of an Indian grocery store.” Lie. They had been sitting side by side in the crypt trying to stay warm. Hux had the fur to insulate but didn’t generate much heat due to his size. Ren provided the warmth and the werewolf acted as his living fur coat to keep the heat in and the chilly stone out. They had traded names. It had taken him forever to convince Hux to say his name out loud. They had only ever spoken mind-to-mind before then.

 

He hadn’t even thought about it. Too used to cinema and fiction. The ‘Ben’ came out like wheezed growl from the snout. Like “Ren”. Hux had immediately oozed shame at being unable to even say his name properly. Had tried to shove Ren out of his head in embarrassment and fear of the cloud of memories surging through their shared mind space.

 

He liked Ren better. It was uniquely his. Not some relic from a dead man he never met.

 

“And it reminded me of the article about the Taj Mahal over in India. And how the marble glows when the sun sets or rises. Cause his fur is red… Did I tell you that before?” Not 100% a lie. At first Armitage was the only name the werewolf had. He must have corrected Ren’s pronunciation fifty times. It led to a debate regarding whether the “h” in “herb” was silent. Which led to a myriad of heated debates about the usage of the letter “u” and whether the word “fuck” could be used in any part of a sentence (it could).

 

At some point Taj had become his nickname. And then the whole thing with Hux’s father got aired out.

 

_Fuck your old man! He doesn’t want you using his name, he can drag his mangy old ass across the lake or whatever you call it and fuckin’ fight me. Hux, Hux, Hux, Hux, Hux. That’s you. You’re the only Hux that I know. Therefore you’re first on the list. Top dog._

His mother hasn’t said anything about his emotionally-charged silence. He’s blinking away frustrated tears, suddenly enraged again on Hux’s behalf. He needs to divert. He’d waited days for Hux to come back. He needs to divert or he’s going to think about the park ranger’s office. He was just supposed to be leading Snoke and his elites off of their trail. Divert. Lose them in the wildfire smoke from upstate. Divert. They set up a meet up time.

 

He called his mother five days after Hux was supposed to come back. Ren knew the ranger had already alerted the authorities before then but it felt like the proper thing to do. To admit it and face it himself. He’d had the realization on the third day.

 

_My ancestors guided lost men out of the woods…_

 

Hux never mentioned his ancestors following the men they guided back into town. Or staying with them. Or needing them as desperately as Ren needed him.

 

He spent the fourth day watching the fires burn with a numb acceptance.

 

“For _God’s sake_ woman, what do you think I’m going to do with my hands cuffed?!”  
  


Ren shoots out of the armchair, nearly clipping his mother in the chin with his knee. He babbles an incoherent apology and makes a sort of soothing patting gesture in the air above her head. He’s having a hard time staying upright as if his head is being pulled to the left by his hair. He turns toward the door.  


 

It’s utterly quiet in the house. Except for Ren’s ragged breathing edging on a devastated whine. Ren drags his shaking hands over his face, pressing his knuckles into his temples. His mother pets quietly at his back, seemingly unconcerned that her son is losing his mind.

 

“We found him a few days before you called on the highway running through Twin Forks. He tore open Snoke’s skull in front of the extraction team meant for you.”

 

Ren stops breathing. His mother keeps running a hand across his shoulders as if to encourage him to breathe again. The little jingle the alarm system makes when a door or window is opened echoes through the house.

 

“What is there to even muzzle? These useless things couldn’t shred a daisy!”

 

There’s the sound of people stomping off the dirt from their shoes. Things being set on the ground. Ren staggers to the closed door of the room. Rests his head against the door.

 

“It took some time for him to recover from the infection. It took even longer to get any words out of him.” His mother sits down in the arm chair he vacated with a soft sigh.

 

Ren’s mind gets dragged along as his cousin hauls two duffel bags up to his room, dropping them at his door with a quiet grunt. His uncle is apparently trying to convince the head of security to uncuff… Hux. He’s here. They dragged him back to Ren when he was too injured to—

 

“It’s a bit difficult with the snout…” he grits out. He wants to drown out the joy with indignation. He’ll have to figure out a way to get him out of here.

 

“You’ve both been a bit difficult,” his mother mutters sardonically. “But at least he recognized me when I stopped by… he calls you ‘Ren’.”

 

He can’t say anything to that. Can’t even swallow the lump in his throat. There’s a resounding click from the foyer as the lock on the handcuffs is disengaged.

 

“He wasn’t particularly pleased about it but he… changed… to better discuss how his discharge from FBI custody would go. One of his conditions was that he’d be afforded accommodations and protections from any of Snoke’s remnants.”

 

His mother stands up, gently pulling his head back from the door so she can open it.

 

“He was rather specific about ‘where and with whom’ these accommodations would be made.”

 

He can feel his mother looking at him. She gives him a small push out the door into the foyer where—

 

Ren laughs, eyes scrunching up. It’s definitely Hux in the foyer. He’s more human-shaped but there’s something purely animal in the way he focuses on Ren. He’s bundled up in three sweaters (judging by the lumpiness) with a scarf covering most of his face. His pale green eyes narrow as Ren laughs.

 

“You absolute _ass,_ ” Hux hisses as he marches with purpose to huddle up against Ren. “I thought the South was supposed to be _warm_.”

 

Ren does his best not to grin devilishly before furiously rubbing at Hux’s arms, knocking him side to side with the strength of it. Hux squawks as static builds and punches him right in the nipple. Clutching his wounded chest Ren grapples one-armed with Hux who seems ready to jab with alarming accuracy at his other pec when his mother calmly intervenes from where she’s leaning against the door frame.  


 

“Boys. Take the rough housing outside.”  


  
Hux looks oddly subdued, as if he just remembered the presence of people other than Ren in the house. Specifically humans with whom the only experience he has is luring to their death.

 

“Of course, mom!” Ren then grabs Hux around the waist and tosses him up onto his shoulder. Hux is limp and winded for a moment before he spread-eagles and clings to the doorframe, trying to keep Ren from getting him out the door.

 

The End


End file.
